A 2003 ATSA (Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers) Research Conference Presentation

1. An Internet Tool to Assist in the Treatment and Supervision of
Sex Offenders in the Community
Stu Frothingham, B.A.1
, Aaron Meyers, B.S.2
1
Washington State Department of Corrections, 2
University of Washington
The Washington State Department of Correction’s Sex Offender Treatment
Program (SOTP) and the University of Washington’s Computer Science
Department collaborated to develop a web-based database application
specifically designed to assist the Community Treatment (CT) portion of the
SOTP. The web-based database application is the primary focus of this paper.
Also included in this paper is a brief discussion about sex offender risk
assessment instruments, the CT program’s need for a database application and
a description of the working prototype that was developed but not deployed. A
discussion about the benefits and drawbacks of utilizing such a web-based
database application is also included in this paper.
The SOTP Community Treatment Program in Washington State
In Washington State, the Department of Corrections provides treatment services
to incarcerated male sex offenders at the Twin Rivers Sex Offender Treatment
Program in Monroe, Washington. Once an offender completes the institutional
phase of the SOTP and releases to the community he enters the Community
Treatment (CT) phase of the SOTP. Washington’s Community Treatment
program is located throughout five distant regions across the state. There are
approximately 300 offenders in the CT Program at any given time.
The institutional portion of the SOTP uses an extensive database to collect
demographic, pre-post treatment testing and risk assessment information about
participants for treatment and research purposes. Currently the Community
Treatment portion of the SOTP does not have a database to store demographic,
risk assessment data or treatment progress reports.
The therapists in the Community Treatment program do however produce
several monthly reports including a Monthly Caseload Tracking Report, Monthly
or Quarterly Progress Reports and/or Discharge Summary’s. There are
significant overlapping components within the reports and each takes substantial
time for the clinician to prepare. Word processing programs are used to
generate reports and therapists go through several time-consuming steps to
complete and disseminate the documents. Embedded in these reports are risk
assessment instruments and demographic data however none of this information
is currently stored in a database so potentially valuable risk-related information is
not fully utilized.
The application discussed in this paper is a potentially powerful tool giving SOTP
CT clinicians a mechanism to automate and consolidate their reporting functions
in order to save substantial time for clinical work. This web-based application

2. stores data, provides Suggested Supervision Levels and provides a tool to
manage and monitor the caseload.
Sex Offender Risk Assessment Instruments
Significant strides have been made regarding the actuarial risk prediction of
sexual offenders. Some of the more recognized and widely-used risk assessment
instruments include the Minnesota Sex Offender Screening Tool-Revised
[MnSOST-R], (Epperson, Kaul & Hesselton, 1998); the Rapid Risk Assessment
for Sex Offense Recidivism [RRASOR], (Hanson, 1997); the Structured
Anchored Clinical Judgement [SACJ-Min], (Grubin, 1998); and the Static-99,
(Hanson & Thornton, 1999), a combination of the RRASOR and SACJ-Min.
These tools primarily focus on static, (historical) factors but not on changeable
(dynamic) variables. The Sex Offender Need Assessment Rating, [SONAR],
(Hanson & Harris, 2000) provided a tool to monitor change (dynamic risk) with
sex offenders. The data collected for the SONAR was however retrospective
and built from the same data set it was tested upon.
The Dynamic Supervision Project:
The Dynamic Supervision Project (Hanson & Harris, in progress) evolved from
the SONAR and continues to focus on stable dynamic and acute dynamic
variables. It is a prospective, 30-month study tracking 1,000 sex offenders in
Canada, Alaska and Idaho. The project incorporates Static-99, Stable-2000
(Hanson & Harris, 2000) and Acute-2000 Dynamic (Hanson & Harris, 2000)
predictors. The scores from these tools are combined (see appendix A) resulting
in a suggested appropriate level of supervision. Hanson and Harris gave
permission to use their materials for the web-based application discussed in this
paper. (Please see appendix B for a brief list of the items used in these tools.)
Description of .NET technology
This application was built on Microsoft Corporation’s ASP.NET platform which
allow users to interface with the database application via any web-browser such
as Internet Explorer, Netscape, AOL or Opera. This application requires a local
server running Microsoft Server 2000 with Microsoft SQL and the Microsoft .NET
Framework.
The UW-SOTP web-based database application
The primary goals of developing this application were to automate and
consolidate clinicians reporting functions and to establish a database to store and
easily retrieve electronic data. These goals were met. If this application is
deployed, therapists will simply use a web-browser to submit reports online. The
advanced features of the database allow the retrieval of archived reports, various
administrative functions and automated scoring of risk assessment instruments

3. including a Suggested Supervision level for each offender in the Community
Treatment Program.
Basic Functions:
As each Monthly/Quarterly Progress Report, Discharge Summary or Risk
Assessment is submitted the user is given an option to printout the report.
Examples of several data-entry and post-submission web pages are included as
attachments at the end of this paper.
To access the web-based application, users direct their web-browser to the
application’s homepage and log-in with their password. Users then click-on the
link to the desired report or assessment which opens the online form. Users then
complete the form using a combination of text and mouse-clicks (to score each
item). Once data is entered, a mouse-click on the submit-button automatically
stores the data in the application. A dialog box then appears and asks the user if
they wish to printout a hard copy of the report. (The report can be easily
retrieved from the application at a later date using one of several Advanced
Functions.)
Advanced Functions:
There are a number of significantly advanced functions built into the design of
this application including:
Hyperlinks: In every Monthly/Quarterly Progress Report and in the Static-99,
Stable-2000 and Acute-2000 risk assessments there are hyperlinks to each
item's scoring rules. There is also an online reference library accessed via
hyperlinks.
Staff Query: Lists the names of the Community Treatment Program’s staff and
affiliated personnel (e.g., Community Corrections Officers).
Current CT Participants Query: This query lists all CT participants DOC#, names,
birthdate, CT start date, region, therapist and days in treatment. The data can be
filtered to only display the offenders on an individual therapist’s caseload or in a
certain region. An option to sort the data is also included on this web page.
Current CT Therapist Caseload: This is a relatively simple query listing each
therapist and the names and DOC#’s of all the offenders on their caseload.
Risk Assessment Query: This query searches for Static-99, Stable-2000 or
Acute-2000 risk assessments while sorting by any combination of user-defined
criteria (DOC#, name, date or risk levels). Once the data is returned the user
can instantly open a hyperlink to view the desired assessment.

4. Missing Intake Risk Assessment Query: This tool lists all CT current participants
who haven’t yet been assessed with the Static-99, Stable-2000 or Acute-2000
risk assessment instruments and the participants total days in treatment.
Staff Query: Lists the names of the Community Treatment Program staff and
affiliated personnel (e.g., Community Corrections Officers).
Current CT Participants Query: This query lists all CT participants DOC#, names,
birthdate, CT start date, region, therapist and days in treatment. The data can be
filtered to only display the offenders on an individual therapist’s caseload or in a
certain region. An option to sort the data is also included on this web page.
Current CT Participant Status Query: This query lists all CT participants and their
current “movement” status such as who “started CT, completed CT, quit CT, was
terminated from CT or transferred CT therapist.” This query can also filter by
region or therapist.
Current CT Participants Violation Status: This tool provides a list of offenders
who violated during the most recent reporting period. Violation “status” examples
include: “no violation, non-sexual rule violation, substance abuse rule violation,
sexual rule violation.” This query can also be filtered by the type of violation the
user wishes to view.
Offender Risk Assessment Query: Provides therapists, Community
Corrections Officers and Supervisors the ability to instantly view all CT
participant’s Static-99, Stable-2000 and Acute-2000 individual risk assessment
total scores and risk levels as well as the Dynamic Supervision Project’s
suggested supervision levels. See the user query selection example below. (To
see the data retrieved by the following query example, see appendix E at the end
of this report.)

5. Report Query: This tool provides the ability to search for any Monthly Progress
Report, Quarterly Progress Report or Discharge Summary sorting by any
combination of user-defined criteria (DOC#, name, date, region or therapist).
See user query selection example below. Once data is returned the user can
instantly open a hyperlink to view the desired report. (To view a full-page
example of this query, please refer to appendix D.)
Missing Report Query: A valuable query tool to identify which Monthly Progress
Reports, Quarterly Progress Reports or Discharge Summary Reports that are
overdue. Searches can be based on any combination of: type of reports, DOC#,
Name, Month, Quarter, Year, Region or Therapist. To see an example of the
data retrieved by the following query example, see refer to appendix C.

6. Benefits of the UW-SOTP web-based database application
This application has the potential to save significant resources. These savings
will be seen by the elimination of the paper trail and almost instant access to
offender data. This system can be used to monitor offender risk levels and will
all but eliminate the need for word processor data entry. Unlike current systems,
this system is adaptable to next generation devices. That is, the next generation
systems will have the ability to extract all of the data from this system into a new
system.
Additional benefits include:
♦ Identification of empirically-based treatment targets and signs of imminent
relapse.
♦ Providing suggested supervision levels based on offenders current risk levels.
♦ Automating reporting functions resulting in a substantial timesavings for
therapists.
♦ Eliminating existing data replication in manual reports.
♦ Establishing a database that can be used for treatment and research
purposes.
♦ Storing reports in one location where they can be easily and instantly
retrieved.
♦ Providing several valuable caseload management tools for the CT program.
♦ Missing reports are easy to identify.
♦ Considerably decreases administrative time spent by staff manually compiling
data from Community Treatment therapists.
♦ Telecommuting via the Internet.
♦ Increasing the security of sensitive information as no data (reports) are stored
on the users hard drive nor sent via-email which is more susceptible to
security breaches.
Deployment considerations with the UW-SOTP web-based application include:
Application Maintenance and Security
After being installed on a local system the application only requires a limited
amount of local system administration. This system administration should be
performed by a local IT professional who is trained on the Microsoft 2000 Server,
SQL and .NET platforms. The administrator’s responsibilities would include
scheduling database backups and granting user access.
No data is stored locally on users computers. All data is stored on a local server
which can be accessed via the local network. Outside access to the database is
strictly prohibited whereas local access can be limited to only those users who

7. require access. Within the local network database access can be partitioned into
read only and/or read/write access.
Note: Outside access can only be obtained if the local network is set up to allow
direct dialup access. If this is the case then the local administrator can lock
down access to only those users who are allowed dialup access to this database.
Risk Assessment Training
It is strongly advised that potential users contact Dr. Hanson or Dr. Harris of the
Dynamic Supervision Project to obtain training focused on the Static-99, Stable-
2000 and Acute-2000 Risk Assessment Instruments.
Summary
The web-based database application discussed in this paper clearly provides a
potentially valuable tool to enhance the quality of the treatment and monitoring of
sex offenders participating in Community Treatment. As with any new
technology it’s strengths however must be considered along with potential
drawbacks.
Contact information:
For more information about the Dynamic Risk Supervision Project, please
contact:
R. Karl Hanson, Ph.D.
hansonk@sgc.gc.ca
Andrew Harris, Ph.D.
harrisa@sgc.gc.ca
For more information about the web-based application discussed in this paper,
please contact:
Stu Frothingham, Aaron Meyers, B.S.
Risk Management Specialist Software Engineer
Washington State Department of Corrections Cardiac Rhythm Management
1516 2nd
Ave., Mezzanine Guidant Corporation
Seattle, WA 98101-1543 6645 185th Ave. NE
206-254-4883 Redmond, WA 98052

8. 206-389-3056 (fax) 425-376-1358
scfrothingham@doc1.wa.gov ameyers@cs.washington.edu
References
Epperson, D. L., Kaul, J. D., & Hesselton, D. (1998, October). Final report of the
development of the Minnesota Sex Offender Screening Tool - Revised
(MnSOST-R). Presentation at the 17th Annual Research and Treatment
Conference of the Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers, Vancouver,
B.C., Canada.
Grubin, D. (1998). Sex offending against children: Understanding the risk.
Police Research Series Paper 99. London: Home Office.
Hanson, R. K. (1997). The development of a brief actuarial risk scale for sexual
offense recidivism. User Report No. 1997-04. Ottawa: Department of the
Solicitor General.
Hanson, R. K., & Thornton, D. (1999). Static-99: Improving actuarial risk
assessments for sex offenders. User Report 99-02. Ottawa: Department of the
Solicitor General of Canada.
Hanson, R. K., & Harris, A. J. R. (2000). The Sex Offender Need Assessment
Rating (SONAR) : A method for measuring change in risk levels. (User Report
2000-01). Ottawa: Department of the Solicitor General of Canada.
Hanson, R. K., & Harris, A. J. R. (2000). Stable-2000 Scoring Guide. Developed
for the Dynamic Supervision Project: A Collaborative Initiative on the Community
Supervision of Sexual Offenders. (www.sgc.gc.ca./publications/ corrections/
200107_e.asp) Ottawa: Department of the Solicitor General of Canada.
Hanson, R.K., & Harris, A.J.R. (2000). Acute-2000 Scoring Guide. Developed
for the Dynamic Supervision Project: A Collaborative Initiative on the Community
Supervision of Sexual Offenders. (www.sgc.gc.ca./publications/ corrections/
200107_e.asp) Ottawa: Department of the Solicitor General of Canada.

10. Appendix A
Calculating Risk Assessment Scores into
Suggested Supervision Levels
First, obtain a “combined” Risk Assessment Rating:
If Static-99 is: And Stable 2000 is: Then combined risk is :
Low
(0,1)
Low, Moderate
(0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
Low
Low
(0,1)
High
(9,10,11,12)
Moderate
Moderate-Low
(2,3)
Low
(0)
Low
Moderate-Low
(2,3)
Low, Moderate
(0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
Moderate-Low
Moderate-Low
(2,3)
High
(9,10,11,12)
Moderate-High
Moderate-High
(4,5)
Low
(0,1,2,3,4)
Moderate-Low
Moderate-High
(4,5)
Moderate
(5,6,7,8)
Moderate-High
Moderate-High
(4,5)
High
(9,10,11,12)
High
High
(6,7,8,9,10,11,12)
Low, Moderate
(0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
Moderate
High
(6,7,8,9,10,11,12)
High
(9,10,11,12)
High
Then, in order to determine the Suggested Level of Supervision merited by the
offender’s historical and current behaviors:
If the Static-Stable
Combined Risk Rating
is:
and this number of Acute
Factors are present
…then the offenders
short-term Risk merits:
Low, Moderate or High none Normal Supervision
Low, Moderate One Concern Extra Attention
Low, Moderate 2 or more Concerns Elevated Risk
High One Concern Elevated Risk
Low, Moderate or High Intervene Now Intervene Now

11. Appendix B
Dynamic Supervision Project Risk PredictorsDynamic Supervision Project Risk Predictors
(Hanson & Harris, in progress)(Hanson & Harris, in progress)
Static-99Static-99
(historical factors)(historical factors)
Prior Sex Offenses
Prior sentencing dates
excluding index
Any convictions for non-
contact sex offenses
Index non-sexual violence
Any convictions?
Prior non-sexual violence
Any convictions?
Any Unrelated Victims
Any Stranger Victims
Any Male Victims
Stable-2000 (treatmentStable-2000 (treatment
targets)targets)
Acute 2000Acute 2000
(signs of imminent relapse)(signs of imminent relapse)
Age upon release
Significant Social Influences
Intimacy Deficits
• Lovers/Intimate Partners
• Emotional Identification with
Children
• Hostility toward Women
• General Social
Rejection/Loneliness
• Lack of Concern for Others
Sexual Self-Regulation
• Sex Drive/Preoccupation
• Sex as Coping
• Deviant Sexual Interests
Attitudes Supportive of Sexual
Assault
• Sexual Entitlement
• Rape Attitudes
• Child Molester Attitudes
Co-operation with Supervision
Victim Access
Emotional Collapse
Collapse of Social Supports
Hostility
Substance Abuse
Sexual Preoccupations
Rejection of Supervision
Unique Factor
Ever lived with adult lover
for at least two years?
General Self-Regulation
• Impulsive Acts
• Poor Cognitive Problem
Solving Skills
• Negative Emotionality/Hostility

12. Appendix C
Missing Monthly Progress Reports
DOC#
Last
Name
First
Name
Reporting Period
Current
Region
Current Therapist
112233 Kent Clark July 2003 Northwest Bruce Wayne
987654 Bannister Bruce July 2003 Northwest Peter Parker
Missing Quarterly Progress Reports
DOC#
Last
Name
First
Name
Reporting Period
Current
Region
Current Therapist
112233 Grimm Ben 2-Spring 2003 West Central Lex Luther
Missing Discharge Summary Reports
There Are No Missing Discharge Summary Reports!

13. Appendix D

14. Appendix E